Americans open Frontier Division Title Series at Home on Thursday

The Great Falls Americans continue their quest for a second straight Frontier Division Championship at home Thursday night against the top seeded Yellowstone Quake.

The Americans advanced to the title series after sweeping Bozeman in the first round, while Yellowstone needed three games to topple Gillette in the best of three series.

Great Falls lost the regular season series to Yellowstone five games to three. The Quake clinched the regular season title in Great Falls with a 5-4 win on the last day of the season back on March 12th.

Great Falls, who won both the regular season and postseason titles a year ago, are excited to get another crack at the team who prevented them from winning the league title this season.

"We're all happy that they beat Gillette, because we wanted another crack at them. We want to take them and go to Chicago," Americans forward Tanner Congdon says.

"We got scored on a little more than we would have liked to the last time we played against them. We went from getting scored on 9 times from them to 2 against Bozeman. We've been really working hard on our defense," Americans defenseman Connor Barta adds.

"They have good forwards. They're well coached. It's one of those things where you gotta bottle up their Forwards a little bit and play well defensively. An obviously in a playoff setting that's very, very important," Americans head coach Jeff Heimel says.

The best of three series begins Thursday night in Great Falls at 7:30. Game two will be Saturday night at 7:30 in Cody, Wyoming. Game 3, if necessary, will be Sunday at 4pm in Cody. The winner advances to the Silver Cup in Illinois, which the Americans participated in last season.

Sayeed Pridgett hit two free throws with a second left to lift Montana to its second straight victory in the Islands of the Bahamas Showcase tournament in Nassau, a 73-71 win over Miami (Ohio) on Saturday.

Sayeed Pridgett hit two free throws with a second left to lift Montana to its second straight victory in the Islands of the Bahamas Showcase tournament in Nassau, a 73-71 win over Miami (Ohio) on Saturday.